The debut album from this Brooklyn, New York-based trio. The band soon after shortened their name to T.F.T.

LINER NOTES

PLAYERS

Andy Cheng, bass guitar, guitar, vocals

John Sullivan, drums

Fontaine Toups, guitar, vocals

GUEST PLAYER

Andrew Malenda, keyboard on 3, 5, 7

PRODUCED BY

Adam Lasus,

and T.F.T.

RECORDED BY

Adam Lasus,

at Fireproof, Brooklyn, New York, USA

MASTERED BY

Joe Lambert,

at Classic Sound, New York, New York, USA

MUSIC COMPOSITION

The Fontaine Toups

except 1 and 2 written with Joe McGinty

COVER PHOTOGRAPHY

John Sullivan

BAND PHOTOGRAPHY

Stefano Giovannini

COVER DESIGN

Mark Robinson, Teen-Beat Graphica

ET CETERA

The band's leader, Fontaine Toups, is a long-time and founding member of the musical group Versus.

REVIEWS

"Some of you may know Ms. Fontaine Toups as the bassist and sultry vocalist for mid-nineties indie-rock favorites Versus. Matching crunching guitars with anthemic singalong pop choruses, Versus crafted a number of catchy but often inconsistent albums, and that inconsistency may have prevented them from experiencing the underground popularity of their golden-age indie-rock contemporaries. Toups now has her own band, and while their sound is not dissimilar to her former group's grand dynamics, their incessantly twee underpinnings grow frustrating over the course of their debut.

Upbeat opener "When I Wake Up" sets the scene with its crunchy distortion and sing-along "do-do-do-doo"s. It's classic early-'90s indie-rock, making up for its lack of ambition with a resonant melody that lingers in your mind long after the song is over. Ironically, that's also the album's major problem -- so many catchy melodies are expounded in the first few tracks that by the time you're halfway through, you've had your fill. By the time "Nico" comes around with its bouncy guitar lines and finger-clicks, it's hard to give a shit anymore. Even promising noise-drenched excursions like "TFT" and "Sunshine Brighter" are undermined by upbeat melodies that'll make you cover your ears and scream "Please! Enough already! Enough!".

Forget the fact that this was exactly the type of music Bettie Serveert were making back in the early '90s, because that's not important; the album doesn't claim to be sonically adventurous. TFT's maddening excess of too-sweet melodies and upbeat instrumentation is exciting for a while, but it'll eventually rot your teeth."